Calm
by Pico the Great
Summary: 50 1sentence themes, set Delta.  Zed's life in Calm, observations and unfairnesses and why he wanted out.  No spoilers past Episode 1.


PTG - 1sentence themes for Zed - specifically for Zed in Calm. Pretty much the only episode of Kiba you need to have seen to understand this set is Episode 1.

Further notes at the end.

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**#01 – Air**

Never moved – there's pictures of kites in books, and great turbines that gave a city power – anyway, everyone knows those're all just nice stories; there hasn't been wind since… since how long?

**#02 – Apples**

Little markets jammed into the thin alleys, impediments if you're running, but impediments to the police you're running from, too (Zed grabs an apple as he vaults the stall and hits the ground at a sprint).

**#03 – Beginning**

His mother's face is slack and staring, and he still tries to talk to her.

**#04 – Bugs**

"Kid, get _outa_ here, you're _annoying."_

**#05 - Coffee**

"No thank you," Noah smiled; "I react badly to caffeine."

**#06 – Dark**

_That_ was the windless city all over – dark grey brown black, with neons and traffic lights; only indoors could you get a little clean light space, and if you were lucky, a fan.

**#07 – Despair**

The thin ambulance gave a thin whine, going away from the house, and someone told him they were sorry, but if she kept getting these fits she'd have to be hospitalized permanently, and he'd have to go to a temporary home with other minors.

**#08 – Doors**

They were there to be broken; he had to get _out_.

**#09 - Drink**

Not that he stayed in the temporary home for long – it was full of teenage alcoholics and crack babies, none with any fight left, or hope.

**#10 - Duty**

They could "you should" and "you shouldn't" and "that's illegal" all they wanted; Zed didn't feel beholden to the laws of a city that he didn't belong in.

**#11 – Earth**

Was all covered with concrete – his tree was one of the few not in a private corporate garden (maybe it used to be one; it was interesting to think why the tree had stayed).

**#12 – End**

"Your grades, as usual, are abysmal, but since you have no parent to speak of to report them to, I suppose that's alright with you."

**#13 - Fall**

People who remembered how his mother had been asked after her health – Zed started avoiding them.

**#14 – Fire**

Footsteps and flame – he looked from door to window quickly, knowing no one in this school would come to help if he called.

**#15 - Flexible**

He didn't remember having moved here, but he got used moving around a lot, and to not knowing people – a few months wasn't long enough in a school to make friends, after a certain age; it was, though, long enough to find alone places to be.

**  
#16 – Flying**

Those dreams he didn't tell Noah about, the ones he woke up from cryin- no, shut up, _nothing_ was _wrong_, _nothing_.

**#17 – Food**

He didn't tell Noah's mom how well she'd cooked, because he thought she knew.

**#18 – Foot**

Step up onto the bench, hook both hands around the branch, and swing his way up into the tree.

**#19 – Grave**

"Zed, don't you ever make jokes?"

**#20 – Green**

That was what he noticed about the place in his dreams – green and light and wide spaced, and _wind_ everywhere.

**#21 - Head**

Raised his head and looked at those marks on his arm, wondering why he always felt them most after one of his dreams.

**#22 - Hollow**

He never much liked being around too many other people.

**#23 – Honor**

Police never got much out of giving him a talking-to, mostly because there was no reason to listen to them.

**#24 – Hope**

Every now and then he felt wind – he would never know when, and be surprised at the gust at his sleeve walking in an alley, at the breeze by his papers in the middle of class, at his face suddenly cool in the summer.

**#25 – Light**

Buildings made their own light; at night, if you were high enough, you could see the clock on the clouds.

**#26 – Lost**

Rusted-rotten chain-link fence around a dead tree, molding benches, all those over top levels of broken glass and bent window-frames, in a triangle of tilted, crack buildings; ah well, may as well sleep here.

**#27 – Metal**

Noah always got to bypass the weapons-detectors at the school doors; he and maybe twenty other students had passes that let them do so, and Noah always waited on the gate's other side for Zed to come first through the line, and then through the extra security check (and that was a privilege only Zed was entitled to).

**#28 – New **(cont'd from 27)

But there was a new guard one day, wouldn't let Noah through even with the pass, so Zed made enough of a fuss that the school president came down; sure he got in trouble, but it also got Noah bypassed and the new guy fired (presumably – he was never there again).

**#29 – Old**

"You're never going to get old; and you _accept_ that?"

**#30 – Peace**

There was something good in knowing that he wasn't from here – it made him free to hate the place.

**#31 – Poison**

The new homeroom teacher went _out of his way_ to aggravate Zed; at least the others had pretended they were being fair.

**#32 – Pretty**

There were a few times when the sky was almost white instead of grey-brown, and then the buildings looked brighter, the traffic lights like hanging lanterns.

**#33 – Rain**

With barely-moving clouds, you didn't get rain – you got mist and drizzle and damp, but not a good, clean-washing thunderstorm like there were stories about.

**#34 – Regret**

He didn't want to leave his mother here, but it was either jump or get caught, blamed for the teacher's death, stay here forever – it was and wasn't a hard choice to make.

**#35 - Roses**

The school had a little greenhouse-room on the fourth floor; Zed figured out when Noah's bio classes were, because with him, he couldn't be accused of Sneaking Around.

**#36 - Secret**

It was rare, but sometimes, when a door was cracking apart, he could see sky between the splinters, and feel a rush of wind as it finally broke.

**#37 – Snakes**

"He doesn't belong in this school-"

"-lawbreaking little tough-"

"-if it wasn't for his mother-"

"-expulsion is really our only option-"

"-can't just let him get away with this, we'll look bad to the public."

**#38 – Snow**

Melted as soon as it touched ground, and sometimes before, so that all you got was slush and cold grey rain.

**#39 – Solid**

Was he really here? and did he have to be?

**#40 – Spring**

Only noticeable because it got warmer day by day by day by day.

**#41 – (un)Stable**

It wasn't hard to hide from neighbors – they didn't know Zed and his mother that well – but only for so long; when her office started calling, she wouldn't answer the phone because she didn't hear it, and Zed didn't want to tell them she was sick another time.

**#42 – Strange**

"Sometimes hair grows in white after a shock – did something like that happen to you, boy?"

**#43 – Summer**

Ice-cream trucks trundled through the afternoon hot mist; only kids had the energy to run in this weather.

**#44 – Taboo**

There were things he and Noah didn't talk about – where Zed stayed when he wasn't in school, how his mother was doing.

**#45 - Ugly**

He had only seen Noah's metal spine once; every time since, he looked away.

**#46 – War**

Most of the dreams were good, but some were ugly, and he didn't understand them, and didn't want to think about them after he woke up.

**#47 – Water**

Collected on the dead branches, dripped in runnels down the trunk, collected in brackish pools at the roots, under the benches, bits of bark and dirt floating in them.

**#48 – Welcome**

"You can stay at my place anytime, you know," Noah told him, quite casually, and Zed, equally casually, nodded and didn't answer.

**#49 – Winter **(cont'd from 48)

He – damn, he _had_ to take that offer up when it got so cold that found gloves and a borrowed coat wouldn't help.

**#50 – Wood**

One summer night, he and Noah stayed at the tree, he on one bench, Noah on the other, both leaning back against the trunk, both talking about what would happen – or not talking, when it got to that.

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PTG - and now, answers!

**What is this?** 50 single words, 50 single sentences. Prompts taken from the livejournal comm "1sentence."

**Why only the first episode?** Because I've only seen 17/51, and don't want to be jossed or spoiled. Also, because I was sad Calm only showed up in one episode - I rather like urban fantasy, and the place looked rather fascinating.

**Where's the pairing?** Ain't no pairing.

That's about it! Hope you enjoyed - it's been a while since I've ficced at all, and this' my first Kiba fic. Awesome show, needs more publicity.


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